1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a roof side weather strip for an automobile for providing a seal between an upper portion of an edge of a door opening in a vehicle body of an automobile and a door glass of a door.
2. Related Art
Conventionally, in a seal construction for providing a seal between an edge of a door opening in a vehicle body of an automobile for a door with a door sash, for example, an opening weather strip is mounted on a flange at the edge of the door opening in the vehicle body and a door weather strip is mounted on an outer circumference of the door sash, whereby when the door is closed, a hollow seal portion of the door weather strip is brought into abutment with a swollen portion of the door sash so as to bring the hollow seal portion and a seal lip of the door weather strip into abutment with an outer panel at the edge of the door opening in the vehicle body to thereby provide a seal between the vehicle body and the door.
As this occurs, a door glass which ascends and descends in an interior of the door is held along its circumference by a glass run which is mounted on an inner circumferential side of the door sash and ascends and descends in a groove portion of the glass run, and a seal between the door glass and the door sash is provided by the glass run.
In this case, however, when looking at a side of the automobile from the outside, the glass run, the door sash and the center pillar become visible around the circumference of the door glass, and hence, there has been room for improvement from the point of view of design. In addition, since the glass run is present between the door sash or the center pillar and the door glass, there exists a gap in surface level between the door sash and the door glass, which has been not preferable from the point of view of design.
To cope with this, as is shown in FIG. 4, an automobile body of a type which incorporates sashless doors is now adopted in which a door sash is eliminated and only a door glass 5 is made to freely ascend and descend in a portion upper than a belt line of a door 1. By this configuration, when looking at the side of the automobile from the outside, only the door glass 5 becomes visible from the outside in the upper portion than the belt line location of the door 1.
In this case, a seal between an upper portion of an edge of a door opening in the vehicle body and the door glass 5 is attained, as is shown in FIG. 4, by the door glass 5 being brought into abutment with a roof side weather strip 110 mounted on an upper portion of a peripheral part 6 of the vehicle body opening. A retainer 4, which is formed integrally with a roof molding 2 functioning as a molding portion, is mounted on the peripheral part 6 of the vehicle body opening.
As is shown in FIG. 5, an upper side portion of the roof side weather strip 110 which lies close to the roof is made up of a mounting base portion 111 which is mounted on the retainer 4 on the peripheral part 6 of the vehicle body opening and a seal portion 150 which is brought into abutment with an upper end of the door glass 5 to provider a seal thereat. The mounting base portion 111 is made up of a vehicle-exterior side wall 120, a vehicle-interior side wall 130 and a bottom wall 140.
The seal portion 150 is formed of a seal wall 151 which is brought into abutment with the upper end of the door glass 5 and a hollow portion 152, and when the door glass 5 is brought into abutment therewith, the seal wall 151 deflects into an interior of the hollow portion 152 and encompasses the upper end of the door glass to provide a seal thereat (for example, refer to JP-A-2003-54329). In addition, a trim 170 is mounted on a flange of the peripheral part 6 of the vehicle body opening so that a cover lip 159 which is provided to extend from the roof side weather strip 110 is brought into abutment with the trim 170 to cover a gap.
In this case, however, being different from the case with the sashed door, the door glass 5 is not held along a peripheral part of an upper portion and side portions thereof by the door sash and the glass run, and hence, the door glass 5 becomes easy not only to be deflected at an upper end position thereof but also to be deflected towards the outside of the vehicle. Because of this, there has occurred a case where the position changes where the door glass 5 is brought into abutment with the seal portion 150 while the door is closed, whereby the seal portion 150 is deformed abnormally to deteriorate the sealing performance.
In addition, in the case of the sashless door, when the door 1 is closed with the door glass 5 kept in a raised position, the door glass 5 is brought into abutment with the roof side weather strip 110 from the side or a lateral direction, and when the door glass 5 is raised or lowered while the door 1 is closed, the door glass 5 is brought into abutment with the roof side weather strip 110 fro below. Because of this, there has been a limitation on the extent to which the sealing performance is satisfied equally when the door glass 5 is brought into abutment with the roof side weather strip 110 from the respective directions.
To deal with this, as is shown in FIG. 6, there exists a configuration in which a hollow seal portion is divided into two so as to provide a seal in two locations such as an upper end of a door glass 5 and a vehicle-interior side surface of an upper end portion thereof, so that seals are provided relative to the respective abutment directions of the door glass 5 by the divided seal portions (for example, refer to JP-UM-A-5-86644).
In FIG. 6, a roof side weather strip 210 of an upper side portion 215 is made up of a mounting base portion 211 mounted on a peripheral part 6 of a vehicle body opening, and a first seal portion 250 and a second seal portion 260 which are two seal portions which are formed integrally with the mounting base portion 211 and separately from each other.
The mounting base portion 211 is made up of a vehicle-interior side wall 230 and a bottom wall 240.
The first seal portion 250 is formed on a vehicle-exterior side of the bottom wall 240 and is formed into a hollow shape by a first seal vehicle-exterior side wall 251 and a first seal vehicle-interior side wall 252 and a first seal abutment wall 253 which are provided so as to extend from upper ends of those side walls so as to be brought into abutment with a distal end of the door glass 5 to provide a seal thereat.
The second seal portion 260 is formed into a lip shape or a hollow shape and is brought into abutment with a vehicle-interior side surface of the door glass 5 when the door glass 5 ascends, whereby a distal end portion 261 is bent to form a groove portion 226.
In addition, a roof side weather strip 310 of a vertical side portion that is mounted on a center pillar has, as is shown in FIG. 7, a mounting base portion 321 which is to be mounted on a vertical side portion retainer 9b provided on the center pillar 6b of the peripheral part 6 of the vehicle body opening, a hollow seal portion 324 formed on a vehicle-exterior side of the mounting base portion 321 and a seal lip portion 325 formed on a vehicle-interior side of the mounting base portion 321. A groove portion 326 is formed between the hollow seal portion 324 and the seal lip portion 325.
This groove portion 326 keeps forming a space even when the door is closed or the door glass 5 is raised whereby the seal lip portion 325 is brought into abutment with the inner surface of the door glass 5 and continues to the groove portion 226 in the upper side portion by way of a similar groove portion in a corner portion.
In addition, also when the door is closed, as is shown in FIG. 7, an end portion of the door glass 5 is not held by a glass run in any case but only abuts with the hollow seal portion and the seal lip portion 325, and the hollow seal portion 324 is slightly exposed towards the outside of the vehicle between the distal end of the door glass 5 and a distal end of a garnish 80.
Because of this, when water under high pressure is applied to the side of the automobile from the outside in an attempt to wash the automobile, the water under high pressure hits directly the hollow seal portion 324, whereby there may be caused a case where the hollow seal portion 324 is depressed to allow the water to enter an interior of the groove portion 326 from between the distal end of the door glass 5 and the hollow seal portion 324 so depressed. There is a configuration in which a drainage groove is formed through which the water 370 that has so entered flows down below the groove portion 326 (for example, refer to JP-A-6-127315 and JP-A-2004-268890.). However, in the vertical side portion which lies close to the corner portion, there may occur a case where the water flows in as far as the groove portion 226 of the upper side portion 215 by way of the groove portion in the corner portion. The water 270 that has so entered stays in the groove portion 226 of the second seal portion 260, whereby there may be caused a case where the water falls into the passenger compartment from the distal end portion 261 of the second seal portion 260 when the door is opened.